Ato Essandoh Quotes

The day will come - and it is not far off - when the legacy of Lincoln will finally be fulfilled at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, when a black man or woman will sit in the Oval Office. When that day comes, the most remarkable thing about it will be how naturally it occurs.

Because of where I come from, I never thought I'd see in my life a black candidate running for President.

We do have a black president, and that means a lot. People ask, 'What has he done?' What he's done is change the color up, which you see on the screen. When the head of the free world is black, there's got to be some sort of spin-off from it.

Africans took a lot of pride in the election of Obama, because it proved wrong those who believe in racist assumptions, that a black man could not live up to a white man.

Obama is the first African-American president, and for some people, that means a great deal, and for some people, it means very little.

Barack Obama's official nomination as the Democratic Party's standard-bearer was a very poignant moment for millions of Americans. As the first non-white major party nominee, Obama is carrying a big load on his shoulders. He's holding the hopes and dreams of a lot of folks who thought the presidency was only reserved for white men.

Black people have been qualified to be president for hundreds of years. George Washington Carver could have been president. I could go on with a list of black men that were qualified to be the president of the United States. So the Obama victory is progress for white people.

Electing a black president was probably the only coup America could pull off.

When I first heard that Barack Obama was going to be the first black president, I wanted to do the smallest, biggest tribute in history.

I would argue further that Barack Obama's election to the presidency of the United States was essentially an American sophistication, a national exercise in seeing what was not there and a refusal to see what was there - all to escape the stigma not of stupidity but of racism.

America is Tiger Woods country for a reason, and she elected Barack Obama to punctuate this new reality.

My grandmother probably never thought she would see a day where, you know, a young black woman would be seen as a leader, which is incredible.

There still aren't many black women on prime-time TV. Times are changing, but it's interesting: we're in 2013 and still experiencing firsts... Hopefully, in the next 100 years, things will balance even more.

The small moments I've had to talk with President Obama, I've told him, 'I get it.' His presidency was in some ways almost overshadowed by the fact that he was the first black president.

For me, Barack Obama's election was a milestone of the most extraordinary kind. On the day he was elected I felt such hope in my heart. I thought we were seeing the beginning of a new era of equal opportunity across race and gender such as America had never known before.

I always believed there would be an African-American president. It was something I'd dreamed about, thought about, but certainly did not believe would happen in my lifetime.

I am for Obama, all the way. I don't support Obama just because he is a black man; I support him because he is an educated black man. He is making black people proud.

I couldn't go to school with whites. Now there are schools that educate everyone.

The reason we had an all-black outfield in '51 is Don Mueller got hurt, so Hank Thompson was a legitimate replacement. So what? People talk about, 'You're the first to do this. You're the first to do that.' Don't dwell on race all the time.

My Uncle, of course, would have been pleased to see someone with brown skin holding the office of president.

The very fact that Barack Obama - an African-American - was twice elected to the presidency will always be the lead line in that hard-to-meld, gold-plated paragraph.

What people forget is that the most radical thing about Obama is that he was the first black man in history to imagine that he could become president, who was able to make other Americans believe it as well. Other than that, he is a centrist, just like I try to be. He's been bridging divisions his whole life.

One of the triumphs of the Civil Rights Movement is that when you travel through the South today, you do not feel overwhelmed by a residue of grievance and hate.

I would say the country is a different country. It is a better country. The signs I saw when I was growing up are gone and they will not return. In many ways the walls of segregation have been torn down.

I have never been more proud of the United States than I am this year. We have elected an African-American president. We have the stellar Michelle Obama setting the standard for American women. I simply cannot say it enough: look how far we've come.